Discrimination Testing
Gains Wider Acceptance

F EDERAL AGENCIES , spurred on by nonprofit groups, are increasingly embracing the use of undercover investigators to identify discrimination in the marketplace.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission now has launched a pilot project using so-called matched-pair testers -- investigators of differing skin colors who pose as consumers to compare how they are treated -- to monitor hiring in Chicago and Washington, D.C. The...